Hela Apparel Holdings achieves new milestones in building social capital

Hela Apparel Holdings recently successfully concluded its biggest graduation ceremony under the P.A.C.E. (Personal Advancement and Career Enhancement) programme alongside the launch of the Hela ‘Diriliya’ initiative. These initiatives are driven by the organisation to uplift and enhance the livelihoods of Hela employees across the globe.

As a social capital focused company, Hela believes in creating an environment of inclusivity and equality, paving the way for each individual to grow within the organisation. With this ethos driving the organization forward, Hela together with PVH introduced P.A.C.E. to its manufacturing facilities in 2019, the company said in a media release.

P.A.C.E. is a foundational life skills training programme designed to improve skills such as communication, problem-solving and decision-making, time and stress management, legal literacy, financial literacy, execution excellence, and sanitation and hygiene. Improving these skills will help employees of Hela feel empowered and increase their confidence levels which will benefit their careers for long term positive growth.

Sharing his thoughts at the event, Shameen Peiris, CEO of Hela Intimates said: “It’s wonderful to see so many of our employees being recognised under the P.A.C.E. programme. With over 19,000 employees across Sri Lanka and Africa, we believe it is our prime responsibility to ensure that each individual who contributes to the growth of the organisation is supported to grow with it. With steady progress since its inception, we hope to see more than 5,000 employees graduate from the P.A.C.E programme by 2024. I take this opportunity to congratulate all 145 P.A.C.E. graduates and Hela’s Social Capital Team for the tremendous work in implementing the programme.”

‘Diriliya’ is another novel initiative developed by Hela as part of its social capital focused approach to uplift the lives of the people in the communities it operates in. Hela Diriliya is designed to encourage employees to come forward with their skills, and build a culture that encourages entrepreneurs. Through this programme employees across Hela will be provided with the knowledge of how to build a business from scratch, develop business models and maintain finances while ensuring product quality. The initiative will also provide selling propositions both internally and externally and aid members to connect with financial institutions for support. Hela Diriliya also helps members develop specific vocational skills, further enabling them to excel in skills such as needlework, dressmaking, pottery and many more.